Tube and SS pairs

In my case, I ended up with a tube pre- & SS amp because of my speakers, Thiel CS 3.5’s. When I first got the Thiels (I’m the second owner), I was driving them with a SS integrated. With it, the Thiels were ruthlessly revealing...poorly recorded material was so harshly presented, it was almost unlistenable. 

So, in effort to tame some of that harshness, as well as introduce some of that tube-sound into my system, I got an Audio Research LS-7 line-stage. I looked at matching the LS-7 with an ARC tube amp. However, I got a lesson in component matching from several great members here:  the Thiels were simply not a great match for the tube amps that were in my budget. Additionally, because of the music I listen to the most (mostly rock, rest Latin/Bossa nova & Jazz), I really didn’t need that extra warmth tubes were going to provide. What I needed was dynamic speed, bass & control. So I went with an ARC D-240 Mk. II SS amp. The two ARC pieces together have been wonderful. Since then, I’ve added an ARC PH-3 tubes phono-stage as well. 

IMO, if you’re going to mix & match, you can’t go wrong with having tubes in the source & pre- stages. However, depending on your speakers & the type of music you prefer, SS may be a better option. I will admit that the advantage of ease-of-use & maintenance are other SS advantages, but I would put those aside because if you’re looking for that lush, warm glow that only tubes provide...you have to go all tube. 

Hope you’re enjoying the music...

Arvin

Audio Research Ref 2 into Pass X350 into Martin Logan Ascent i. Generally I think SS amps are less critical of speaker loading than tube power amps and it’s easier to get more power and current from SS.

With that said there are plenty of good tube amp / speaker combinations out there it just takes a little more effort to find that combo.

Thanks for the replies and examples posted.

I realize my question was a little vague so I would like to rephrase it just to look at it from a different angle:

If you were to build a system from the ground up, would you get a SS amp to mate with a tube pre amp or a tube amp to mate with a SS preamp? I'm mainly interested in the difference of sound it would produce - theoretical or from experience. Maybe there is no answer or significant difference or it hasn't been studied so to speak. 

Thanks again

Not to make the question more complicated, but if your source was cd, preamp -SS, and amp- tube, would you then have more signal/information loss, maybe more harmonic distortion than a simpler, one time, digital to analog conversion?

On a different note, once I bypassed my preamp and connected my CD player to my SS amp with short directional audioquest cables and was amazed with the improvement - I had to be careful though with the recording level of the CD. Most CDs were too loud for this.

So the system I mentioned above, ARC REF 2 (Tube) + Pass X350 (SS) + Martin Logan Ascent i, the preamp seems to be dominant in how the system sounds and while the Pass has it's own sound changing the preamp or rolling or replacing tubes in the preamp has a more noticeable delta in sound.

A third system I have is made from ARC LS3 (SS) + VTA ST70 (tube) + Altec Model 19. The 19s are an easy load and the 35 WPC from the ST70 easily does the job. The LS3 has that ARC house sound and is quiet enough to be used with these sensitive speakers. Rolling tubes in the power amp can change the sound. Again the tube component dominates the sound.

The second system is an ARCLS25 (tube) + ARC Ref 110 (tube) + JBL 4430. While on the surface the 4430 seems like a simple two way studio monitor it's very sensitive to the amp driving it. I've had these for years and they are very forward sounding, with the wrong amp they can be too much. I was using an Adcom GFA 5802 (SS) and was pretty happy with it. I got the bug to try a big tube power amp and picked up an ARC VT100 (tube). Everything from the midrange on up I liked better than the Adcom. Percussion in particular. Problem was a lack of deep bass. Managed to find the Ref 110. With the KT120s it came with it had more bass but the thing sounded congested and floppy. Retubed with new 6550s and now I have about 90% of what I had with the VT100 plus nice articulate deep bass. But it also lost some of that presence that I liked.

So I guess where I'm going is the tube component will probably dominate the overall sound of the electronics in the system. Also as I said before matching a tube power amp and speakers might take a little more work.

Direct connect to your source is just cheating. Just kidding. I haven't really spent any serious time with that configuration.